


Serve My Eyes and Liver to a Horny Eagle

by draw_a_circle_thats_the_foxhole



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Human Names Used, M/M, Warning: sexuality, two snarkey old farts being old, warning: STDS, warning: emotional repression, warning: shit parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-14 15:29:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29669388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/draw_a_circle_thats_the_foxhole/pseuds/draw_a_circle_thats_the_foxhole
Summary: In both the 80s and 1980s AD, Francis scandalises Arthur and gets cursed for his trouble.
Relationships: England/France (Hetalia)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 16
Collections: Historical Hetalia Week (February 2021)





	Serve My Eyes and Liver to a Horny Eagle

Francis yawned, curling an arm through the crook of Arthur's elbow and drawing himself close to rest his head on his shoulder. It was late in the day, and the yawn was false, a hint he wanted to be taken home and fucked because Francis' hand was soon on his ass. Arthur sighed. He would have done better to take Francis up into the impressive parts of the museum, rather than wander about the archives. The man always had been weak for a proper ionic column. Instead, the only columns were the aluminum frames of endless rolling archive shelving stacked with acid free boxes of delicate crêpe paper-wrapped artefacts. And dust.

“Good lord, you practically beg me to take you out and entertain you. So I take you to the bloody museum— and you decide to molest me in public instead?”

“I said take me on a date, Angleterre,” Francis said. “Accompanying you on errands isn’t a date,”

“It's the British Museum!” Arthur huffed. “It's as close to properly romantic as I've got,”

“Its a dungeon,” Francis said.

“It’s an archive!”

“In the basement,” Francis pointed out. “And I don’t mind seeing the Romano-British collection, it’s always lovely to recall that your recent foray into scandal hasn’t come from nowhere,” He pinched Arthur by the ear lobe where a hole had been recently punctured but the earring removed. “But I do mind you dragging me into the catacombs and calling it courtship,”

“And do you honestly require more wooing? My backside was skyward all weekend,” Arthur said, smacking his hands away. “Leave that be,”

“Is that a piercing?” Francis laughed in delight and his laughter sounded like a guffawing rooster. “My, my, I haven’t seen one of those on you since— Merde, were the Stuarts even on the throne yet?”

“Yes,” Arthur snapped. “I didn’t get rid of it until, blimey, the Glorious Revolution I think?”

“Three hundred years!” Francis said as if astonished. “Three hundred years since you’ve had a piercing,”

“Oh hush,” Arthur said, cranking a new shelf open to match the noted number the archivist had written on a scrap of paper.

“No, no, it becomes you,” Francis said by the sound of it Arthur’s dragging him into the archive had been forgiven. “Tell me, are you going to take up pirating again?”

“Privateering,” Arthur automatically corrected him. “I always had a letter of marque! It wasn't just lawless drunken pillaging,”

“Sadly,” Francis sighed. “You are most becoming when you’re swooning about rum drunk with a rapier. But tell me, what does Mrs Milk Snatching Maggie Thatcher think about the new earring? Or does she approve of that and the pillaging, as long as it's Argentina,”

“Oh don't start,” Arthur said.

“Why not?” Francis said and now he was wearing an open expression of delight. “I never said I minded the pillaging.” His tone was filthy but he continued on. “Though, your children's opinions on pillaging? Mm, if only you could control them!”

“You’re the one who funded the reason I can't!” Arthur said. “But what has Alfred gone and done now?"

“Not that one! The youngest of them! He's trying to make me return half the Louvre,” Francis said. “And your marbles!"

“Which marbles?”

“Your marbles!” Francis pointed out.

“My marbles?” Arthur snorted. “I haven't had those since Jack was born,”

Francis rolled his eyes. “The Elgin Marbles?”

“Ah,” Arthur said. “Those,”

“Oui, yes, those,” Francis said. “I’d like to see them before that wine wrecking son of yours has them hauled back to Greece,”

“You’re only bitter because he and Eleanor have grown up to be quite the pair of vitner,” Arthur said, proudly. As far as the eyes could see in Australia and New Zealand, vineyards flourished in the red clay and emerald hills.

“You should have disciplined him when you had the chance,” Francis said, a sly grin pushing up the corner of his mouth. Arthur didn't respond.

“What, like you were so successful with Matthew?”

“I was a fine father!”

“The boy couldn’t communicate anything too me for a century,” Arthur said. “Do you know how many times he just fell right into that river and jolly well drowned because he was too nervous to tell anyone he wasn’t well? Yes, spectacular parenting on your part,”

“I—” Francis said, and looked surprised and a little soft. “That often?”

“At least twice a decade once we got lumber off the ground,” He said, moving down the aisle. “Jack’s willful, but at least the lad’s not shy. And nothing will come of that fools errand with the Elgin marbles, the legality is all quite clear,”

Francis continued on behind Arthur as he kept digging through rows of boxes looking for the proper section. But it wasn’t long before he was sighing sentimentally again. "Could you speed this up, I'd like to see some actual art while we're here. Revel a bit in the in the grandeur and artistic glory of Graecia,"

"So you can pretend to remember what she looked like?" Arthur said. "As you wax poetic about the faux glory of the classical world? No thank you,"

"Must you take the joy from everything?" Francis glowered. "What are we even here to see anyway?"

"Must you always apply so much sentimentality to _everything,_" Arthur retorted but shrugged. "We'll go see something else in a moment, I have to look at something,"

"What?" Francis said. "What could you possibly have to look for in this dungeon?"

"Bloody hell if I know," Arthur shrugged. "The boxes call number was in my red box last week,"

"Your red box?" Francis said. "From the government?"

"Who else?" Arthur said.

"I thought you were on the outs with them again,” Francis commented. “Or is that your children? Did Eleanor throw a tantrum over espionage again? Or are you still quarreling with Argentina? Or oh no, it was Iceland wasn’t it. Your fish and chips fetish gone too far this time,”

Arthur sighed. It had been a Greek-Australian organisation that had begun that nonsense with the Elgin marbles and Margaret Thatcher was an English bull dog to her heart but honestly, the drama of Francis. But at last, Arthur pulled the box from the store and “You know, you could at least pretend to be interested in it,”

"Interested in what?" Francis said, dramatically "Why we’re down here this mouldering pit? Is it to make love? You always did like shagging in the trenches too much for my liking. But I draw like line at underground sex in peacetime,”

“My history?” Arthur said, igoring the implications of his sexual preferences as he removed the lid of the cardboard carton and removed whatever was inside. It was heavy, an uneven earthen rectangle wrapped in paper.

“Your history? Angleterre, my dearest Angleterre, how could I not be interest? I was there for the majority of it,”

“You were,” Arthur said dimly. He parted the folds of paper and found himself staring at a clay tablet scratched with lettering. He ran a finger across one of the letters. It was the first letter of the latin alphabet, but the word it began he didn’t recognise,

“It’s in latin,” He said.

“Well read it then and lets be on our way. The lighting down here is terrible for my skin. Halogen lamps age people you know,”

“As if millenia haven’t,” Arthur said and traced the whole word, trying to remember why the crooked lines of text, unevenly written as if carved into clay by a child seemed so familiar. He tried to summon the old language but couldn’t seem too.

“Bordel de merde,” Francis exclaimed, snatching the tablet from Arthur’s hands. Arthur wondered why he was so loathe to let him have it.

“Protestants,” Francis muttered. “Worse yet, English protestants. Your son rules the world now so you think you don’t have to go and bother with anyone else’s language,”

“It’s a dead language,” Arthur said, switching to French to make a point.

“Yes, yes,” Francis said, waving him off, squinting at the lettering. Arthur hovered at his shoulder, peering over his arm to watch him read.

“Well, what on earth’s it say?”

“Angelterre,” He said, instead of answer “Is this yours?"

“Well, I hope so, as it's in my bloody museum,”

“No, I mean— did you write this?"

“I don’t quite know,” He said. “If I did I was hardly alive yet,”

“It is,” Francis said. “Look there at the R, you still give it that ghastly flip on the last letter.”

He laughed, and Arthur tried to remember carving his words into the lead. It didn’t seem possible, but so many many long memories were stuffed away in his mind and the national consciousness between his ears and under his sternum.

“What does it say?” He asked.

“Does it say when it's from?” Francis asked, squinting at it harder. “On the box maybe?”

Arthur looked and found a typewriter label on the corner of the box. “Romano-British Curse tablet, Aqua Sulis, 1st Century AD,”

Francis chuckled. “It is yours,” He said and cleared his throat to translate. “‘I would make it your will o goddess of health to smite the son of Gauls with…’” Francis squinted at the words. “Your Latin really was terrible, I think that one means venereal disease. Good lord, Arthur, you really have not changed. Merde, did you really ask Sulis Minerva to serve my eyes and liver to a horny eagle?”

“I suppose I did,” Arthur said, wishing he could remember. “Do you remember why I wrote that?”

“Aqua Sulis is where I first kissed you,”

“We were children,”

“It was on the cheek! A chaste peck, swear on the blue cloak of the virgin!” Francis laughed and took his hand. “Really, cursing me with venereal disease? That young?”

“Well you did die of syphilis at least once,” Arthur pointed out fairly. “So it was prescient,”

“Arthur?

“Mm?” Arthur hummed as Francis looked at him, a strange mix of fondness and mirth in his face his eyes sparkling. “Never change,”

* * *

Note: 

_Serve My Eyes and Liver to a Horny Eagle:_ I got stoned and tried to translate first-century Latin curse tablets when I haven’t touched the language since catholic school and am still dying with laughter. 

_Arthur’s Earring and Privateering and shoulder pads_ : It’s the 1980s. Why the hell not lmao. But also a reference to a semi-famous portrait of [privateer Sir Walter Raleigh](https://www.nps.gov/people/walterraleigh.htm).

 _Letters of Marque:_ Look, I’m Canadian, [Barrets Privateers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_58h7sZDAUA) was gonna slide in here eventually. But they were actually official documents that allowed semi-private ships to raid the unholy fuck out of other nation’s merchant vessels.

 _Stuarts and Glorious Revolution:_ British dynasty one of whom went catholic and shit England went mental before protestant queen Mary 2 and her Dutch hubby took over. They and then Queen Anne died childless so we got the Hanovers and the beginning of proper parliamentary documentary. 

Argentina: [Falklands War!](https://www.britannica.com/event/Falkland-Islands-War)

 _Mrs Milk Snatching Maggie Thatcher:_ Thatcher, the worst fucken kind of neoliberal tory cut spending and the welfare state immensely, including free [childrens milk in schools earning her this nickname](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/margaret-thatcher-regretted-snatching-milk-school-children-two-decades-a7500171.html). She was incredibly unpopular at home and abroad in certain parts of the commonwealth and continental Europe. 

_Australia and the Elgin Marbles_ : Originating from the Greek-Australian community, the [first organisation from outside Greece formed to work for the return of the Elgin Marbles to Greece came from Melbourne! ](https://iocarpm.wordpress.com/)It got brought up a few times in Commonwealth Meetings and all of Britain basically rolled its eyes at the colonies. Keep doing your best, Jack. 

_France and the hostility of ANZAC Weans_ : Referencing the shitshow known as the Rainbow Warrior Incident which the French called, I shit you not, **[Opération Satanique](https://nzhistory.govt.nz/politics/nuclear-free-new-zealand/rainbow-warrior)** as well as Australian and Kiwi wine doing better in traditionally French controlled markets. The kids do not approve of this shit! 

_England and Conflict:_ Arthur “Fucken Fight Me” Kirkland was in full swing in the 1980s. 

_Curse Tablets:_ [This is based on real artefacts](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_curse_tablets) [held in the British museum!](https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_1978-0102-148) Lead sheets with curses written on them! 

_Never change:_ THEY’RE IN LOVE OKAY? 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr here:
> 
> https://draw-a-circle-thats-the-foxhole.tumblr.com/
> 
> I post history and Hetalia and aesthetics.
> 
> Kudos, comments and critiques are life. Thank you for reading!


End file.
